Tuesday, February 26, 2008

Haulin' Ass (and some furniture): Moving by Bike

I come across a lot of material that underscores the many differences that exist among the various subsets of the cycling population. However, once in awhile I also encounter something inspirational that reaffirms the fact that, as cyclists, we are all a part of a community. And, as this video shows, when that community comes together there's almost no limit to how irritatingly self-righteous we can be.

That's right, Fascist war machine: the forces of gentrification no longer need your fossil fuels to power their relentless march across Brooklyn. When this woman was priced out of her Fort Greene aparment and decided to price someone else out of an apartment in neighboring Crown Heights, she didn't just gas up a U-Haul. Instead, she assembled some friends who also wanted attention and did the whole thing by bike.

This is perhaps the most moving film about moving I've seen since Richard Pryor's "Moving." There are many wonderful moments here, but to me the most inspirational by far is when the fixed-gear rider joins in to move a single plant. Sure, the cynical among you might say that a token effort like this is almost as insulting as actually sitting on the sofa and drinking a Snapple while your friends are moving it, but to me it's a bold statement about how even the smallest effort counts towards making a change.

In fact, as I watched them tenderly working together to secure the plant to the rack, I realized that this beautiful green thing was actually a metaphor for the heart of of our community and the greenness of their endeavor.

Almost as stirring was this image of the moving crew making its way towards Crown Heights, their Cones of Smugness lighting the way. I was touched by the manner in which they shared their labor, much as they will probably come to share the bedbug infestation undoubtedly borne by that futon. (Futons are the public restrooms of the furniture world.)

To me, this procession of fools evoked Ingmar Bergman's "The Seventh Seal," except that they substituted despair with an overblown sense of pride.

But it wasn't all haughtiness and heavy lifting for our protagonists. They also took a break from their labors to rub other people's noses in their accomplishments. Here they stopped to ask a man removing an armful of boxes from the back of a truck if he was moving. If you've ever fallen off your bike and found yourself lying in a pool of your own blood, only to be asked by a passer-by if you've had an accident, you can begin to appreciate the sort of irritation this guy probably felt. To me, the fact that he didn't reply by hurling an end-table at the cameraman speaks volumes about his patience and renews my faith in humanity. Especially when you consider that the cameraman was probably wearing a cone on his head.

So what have we learned? We've learned that it is possible to move your possessions over a short distance without using a motor vehicle. We've also learned that it is that much easier when the weather is in your favor, you've got a bunch of friends who don't have jobs, and your personal politics preclude you from owning bulky items like televisions. But most of all, we've learned that fixed-gears aren't just for riding in self-indulgent videos; they're also useful for transporting plant life in self-indulgent videos.

You wanna know who is smug? Me! I made my first podium on my first attempt at a sprint finish. I would like to thank my stupid patella tendon, which has kept my off my bike and out of my running shoes. If it wasn't for that stupid tendon, I would be out riding right now....and relegated to 100th. I guess it has all been worth it, standing just below Chunk and anonymous, who thought he had won the sprint.

Lets see: two trips by what looks like about 10 bikes for two pieces of furniture and misc. stuff for a one bedroom apartment. It took about 3-4 hours. And one of them was a bike made special to haul things (not the fixie with a rack). I agree with the mover with the uhaul, sometimes you just have too much stuff to haul. If they had a two or three bedroom apartment it would have taken all day. Right on about the smugness of the makers of the video snobs, snob!

Finally we can refocus our scorn to where it belongs! Away from pros who are really trying to mind their own business what with their doping schedules and all (when was the last time a pro cyclist tried to tell you how you should be living your life or posted a video of themselves on youtube riding around in circles?) and back onto greenie weenies who exhale the stale corruption of smug psychic pollution.

In any eco-cycling venture, in addition to real things like saving gas and getting exercise, well-meaning participants are prone to conjuring up all sorts of other benefits. The girl in the video says that the bike takes up less room on the road than a U-Haul. But 6 bikes, with the trailers, and that girl with one potted plant on the rack, all taking 2 trips--sorry, you can't count reducing traffic as one of your good deeds.

Todd: There are probably 10s of thousands of blogs,websites,community venues and drum circles where you can go and get your good vibe on and discuss sustainable agriculture, hemp underpants,and exchange macrobiotic recipes using free-trade ingredients. This is not one of those places. Acrimony is the commerce of the blog. Love it or leave it.

They probably got the idea from the guy (can't remember his name right now) who attached a couch to the back of a bike and rode his friends around like a La-Z-Boy equipped rickshaw. It was funny until is friend was unable to apply enough brakes going down a hill to overcome gravity and momentum and they crashed into a truck. Brilliant!

Well, I thought for sure that Ye Olde Snobe would lay into the latest threat to the Tour, but I'm actually relieved to see this bit of whimsy instead.

Say, lady, there's a reason everyone in China and Mexico is buying cars and trucks as fast as they can. While toting produce to the market on a bike is romantic to certain sets of Westerners, it's also Really Hard Work.

As in: Along the edge of the Bay in San Francisco? Perhaps that's where "Brooklyn's Big Gay Rickshaw Driver" learned his trade. They're out there -- just waiting to give you a ride up over those steep hills!

Most people here don't seem to have a problem with the moving. It's just the smugness that's hard to stomache. Going out of your way to tell some stranger unloading a Uhaul that weeee're moving by biiiiike is just plain obnoxious. Not to mention presumptuous.

Bike Snob:If this video is representative of the type of folks that you are surrounded by in NYC, it is no wonder that you have sequestered yourself like Howard Hughes, it also explains the Herzog movies. This type of behavior would have me back in the tower before you could say "Cone of Smugness."

As I have said many times to judgemental non-cyclists about my own transport habits "don't knock it till you try it". A bike move takes the always tedious and process of moving and turns it into a fun event. How much can you haul? Loaded bike sprints? Cargo bike derby? Beers and burros at the end. Get the lemon out of yer maw and try something new every once in a while, bikesnob!

I'm pretty sure between that triathalon picture, the bike "dancing" video, fixed gear freestylers who are into imitating eastern european bike dancers (the other kind), and the undeniable greenie lameness, cycling as a whole is completely indefensible against any attack by anyone.

I mean even a gay rodeo where you try to put panties on a goat is less irritating.

That one guy is pretty funny. If only everyone would stop spending weeks at a time sitting around on the couch watching TV, then we would all have time to move things on bikes. It's just a matter of willpower!

Anonymous said... You guys are so harsh and judgmental, kudos to these folks for doing something different and putting it out there.

What's so different about this? We have hundreds of homeless people in our town that do this every day, with their possessions in plastic bags while muttering about the government-Campbell's soup conspiracy.

As for the smugness, c'mon, it's New Yawk, there is no point in doing anything in New Yawk unless you can get in someone's face about it. This was my theory for the high murder rate in the 70s, so many smug a-holes just begging to get shot in the face.

Also: My friends who've helped me move don't have time to track down trailer-bikes, let alone make a whole "fun day" out of hauling stuff. They're already doing me a favor by showing up and moving my junk for a couple hours.

ka_jun thanks for posting that cannondale link, as I was looking at it I kept thinking to myself, this seems like something I seen before and then it hit me, they were ripping off a concept bike from a German company called cube almost to a T

Their slow procession probably slowed enough vehicles that the collective increase of the cars emissions created a greater carbon footprint than if they had just rented a van and did it in one trip.

think about it, if 100 cars spent an extra 5 minutes in traffic waiting for these bufoons then that is an extra 500 minutes of emissions where as it would have taken maybe 30 minutes to make the trek in a van and not impede traffic flow.

Nothing is wrong with having fun and moving by bike. Holding up traffic and rubbing somebody's face in "your fun" is the problem. Post a video of yourself going to a play and we'd be happy to dish on that too.

Besides these fools are here so we may amuse ourselves by pointing our finger and going, "ha-ha". It is just one big circle jerk of happy acrimony.

Oh and I beleive stars generate their energy through fusion not fission.nyahh...ha-ha

Right you are! We should use this opportunity to think deep thoughts and contemplate our short-comings.

BSNYC --

As long as Captain Picard is playing Macbeth at BAM, you should consider the not-of-woman-born conundrum posed by the Bard and its implications for adventures in moving and transportation alternatives in Brooklyn.

Does the bearing of a futon bearing bedbugs borne by a woman, but not of woman born, between brownstones bespeak doom?

Or are bloggers’ borne ultimatums an unbearable bourne of consciousness? You know, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing – that sort of thing.

I mean what else is there to talk about? Not to pick nits, but you’ve already answered what rough beast slouches toward Crown Heights to be borne (yet again).

Everybody on fixed gear gallery claims they chop down their riser bars to little stubs in order to slip through traffic. It's a shame those dudes in the UC santa cruz "track bike" video rode around for like 20 minutes with no traffic jams, because they are totally prepared!

FYI: I am currently working on a 3 part docu-drama entitled “Wake-Up Call: My Morning Trip to Starbucks.” Part 1 begins with me denying the offer of a double cup for my 20 ounce Americano. The awe struck expression of reverence on the face of the barista is truly eco-inspirational. Part 2 has some gritty footage of me vehemently refusing to even use a cup cozy even after acknowledging that the product contains at least 15% post consumer waste. Unfortunately part of the dialog is obscured here by the guy in back of me mumbling “hurry the fuck-up you moron”, but it’s still quite a poignant exchange. Part 3 climaxes with me asking for Soy milk instead of half&half as a gesture of solidarity with my imprisoned bovine brothas and sistas. The parting shot is of me smugly sipping the fruits of my labor in the heated leather seat of my Subaru Forrester. Its 40 degrees outside, but I’m…sniff…..Warm. I have some final editing to do, but will post when it’s all done.

Snob, you're bitter and cynical. But I guess I like those traits because I keep reading here every day. ;-)

Now that 2nd video you linked up, ug. I started watching the two dudes riding around and then noticed it was 10 minutes long. Abort. Sorry, but even bored I don't feel like wasting 10 minutes of my life watching that.

hi. i am the one who rode the plant around on moving day. i appreciate all of the media attention. thanks, bike snob.

in reference to this portion of your post:

"To me, the fact that he didn't reply by hurling an end-table at the cameraman speaks volumes about his patience and renews my faith in humanity. Especially when you consider that the cameraman was probably wearing a cone on his head."

it is so easy to make assumptions, and maybe even easier in these anonymous cyber-forums. there is one that bugged me.

so in this case let me just make two important corrections:

1)it was actually a cameraWOMAN who shot this short film. yes, i know. hard to believe. women use video cameras these days too.

I for one would honestly be impressed if the video JUST showed them moving, and nothing else. Leave out the "we're greener than you" voiceover and the snobula surely wouldn't have even mentioned the video.

Thanks so much for posting! I mistakenly assumed the guy credited as the filmmaker, Nicholas Whitaker, shot it, but I see now if I had paid more attention to the credits I would have realized he didn't. Sorry for the mistake.

I think calling the UC Santa Cruz movie "self-indulgent" is unfair. If you look at the comments on YouTube below the video, the poster graciously gave another fixed-gear rider some tips on how to skid while sitting in the saddle.

On second thought... I can see why you might consider buying a HED wheel for that style of riding when there are people starving in Africa and people moving by bicycle in Brooklyn to be a little self-indulgent.

BSNYC made a mistake concerning the gender of the person filming, so you get all text-book snarky-feminist on him. Only turns out his was an innocent mistake, and not sexist after all. At least you proved your point about why you shouldn't make assumptions!

Yes, Bike Snob thank you for the press and the afternoon worth of affirmation. Caroline, i don't remember feeling smug while dodging trucks parked in the bike lanes, and triple parked cars do you? I do feel a bit smug now though, the comments on this page make me want to keep doing videos. Such great discourse, such creative stereotyping and insults. Wow, i mean really. I'm glad that you all feel better about yourself and really "stuck it to us" in the comment thread. Next film will definitely have to be on how to spend the day at your desk job tearing down people with snarky comments on a niche blog so that you can somehow better identify yourself as "in" or better than those dirty hippy/hipsters/feminists/queers/gentrifiers/ or whatever other contemporary off the shelf label you want to slap on someone. I can film one of you guys maybe, and then come back in ten years for a follow up and see where life has taken you. We can reminisce about how you used to really tear people a new one online. Yeah...those were the days. Enjoy your drive home to Cobble Hill or Willamsburg in your hummers.Oh....just kidding

dunno what sheriff john is talking about, but somebody should do a trailer & extracycle alleycat, where instead of getting a card or whatever at the checkpoint you have to pick up, like, a Jennifer Convertibles.

My pleasure Bike Snob, i mean, do you think such ironic and smug people like myself and my friends would frequent just any old blog. No sir, only the best for us. i mean, i need to feel like i belong to a niche group myself you know. How else would i get the motivation to make the films i do?

Nicholas:Dude you made a movie about hauling some crap a few miles on a bike and tried to turn into the Kyoto Summit, you deserve all the mocking this blog can dish out. Get over yourself, what you did was not interesting and or important. What's next, a film of you taking a shorter than usual shower to conserve water, or perhaps pics of you and your cronies carrying aluminum cans to the recycling bin; now that's hardcore enviromentalism in action. Mock,Mock,Mock.

I wonder how much energy was really saved. Once you calculate the calories burned during this heavy-load three-four hour excursion (keep in mind, this trip was made by several people, not just one) and thus the food needed to be produced, prepared, and eaten to account for all of that, at BEST you're probably saying you replaced an oil energy cost with a slightly smaller food energy cost. Now, if the production and preparation of your food ITSELF contained an oil energy cost (like in harvesting and transporting the food), these... self-satisfied...THINGS... didn't really accomplish anything.

This point stands even if one neglects the fact that moving itself is a minor minor minor minor energy cost even taken on the whole. What percentage of people move in a given year? Over how great distances? For how long are trucks actually running during these trips? Obviously, replacing trucked moving with biked moving is insignificant compared to replacing driven commuting with biked commuting. What great revelation do these people think they came up with? It reminds me of someone who comes up with an additional ingredient to a Waldorf salad. They get all excited and think they've made a huge difference, when in reality they've contributed practically nothing!

Please, make more videos, the internet needs more of this awareness that stuff can be carried on bikes. You are making a huge difference, man, I can see the carbon levels dropping in Manhattan as we speak. And please, continue the response to comments about videotaping your fascinating life and equating those who find this a tremendous wank, to queer-hating Hummer drivers. Although, from by pedestrian, suburban understanding of you urban sophisticates, queers kinda like hummers...as do we all.

This will affect me as I drive to my 9,500 square foot whale-oil heated home in Cobble Hill in my baby seal oil-burning converted stretch Hummer H1, maybe, just maybe, the wife and kids and I won't go on vacation to Brazil to level 1000 acres of rainforest this year, ...just maybe.

Great video, the sense of accomplishment is richly portrayed, near the end, I could almost smell the patchouli.

BikesnobNYC you should just stop writing this blog I mean last Monday when you didn't post I got all worried and nervous, you know like most people have a cigarette with coffee well I got you with my coffee and if you took it away I would do quite a bit to try and get it back, if you stop writing or only write randomly, or start another covert blog that only the coolest online cyclists know about then maybe all this comment nonsense will stop?

Considering those two factors weren't mentioned several times as incentives, whereas the environmental ones were, it seems to me that you're pretty vastly missing my point.

Also, I'm sure you thought you shattered my world when you thought (erroneously) that your point nullified my own since maintaining a thought for more than a sentence at a time seems like a great achievement to you. I, on the other hand, wouldn't have cared that much if I had been seriously mistaken about the movers' intent since the time I would have wasted would have instead been spent falling asleep in class, making my professor angry. Thanks for the diversion, BSNYC!

Niche blog readers unite to slam the nouveau-chic no matter where they earned their liberal arts degree from! And now that liberal arts school is over, eight possession having, move by bicycle klan, here is an important thing to recognize: out here, in the real world of grown ups and niche blog readers, your lecture hall insulation is gone! When you do something silly, it will be called as it is- silly. You wanted the attention, and now you're getting it.Also, even with the worst public school education, I would think you'd know the term "man" does not refer to "those with a penis". It refers to "mankind", the shared race known as "human". So please, for the love of God, do not bring your cute, sophomoric, politically correct crap out on display in a blog that is well known for it's critical deconstruction of the moronic.

Anon 5:24:What am I missing? If you like the post and not the comments, then just read the post and not the comments, or is someone holding a gun to your head? If so, mention Burt Ward in your next post and we will send help.

From utterly mundane, commonplace events: dogs barking in kennels, people looking at a subway map while riding the subway... Noteworthy stuff like that. The kinds of things people should document and celebrate, you know?

someone needs to invent a sarcasm type face, kind of like an italic. That way, when reading a comment on a blog you will understand it in its proper sarcastic context and would there fore prevent endless amounts of misappropriated bickering and would inversely promote more people being pissed of and insulted in a more correctly understood manner

Papa Mario used to be a removalist, like a permanently removed if yooda get my meaning. Da Pappa wanted Mario tio geta into da family buzyness but Mario was too busy slipping da salami into the young senoritas on da futons instead of moving da stuff in. Pappa now just shakes his head and mubbles about da good old daze of hard work ,twelve gauge shotguns and driving his fiat bambino around full to the brim with da funitures honking his horn at da bella senotitas

You haven't see the worst of that effort yet! The following links show not only how to move house by a fleet of bikes but by a load bike as well!http://www.moz.geek.nz/mozbike/see/move-to-frampton-lane/index.htmlhttp://www.moz.geek.nz/mozbike/see/move-to-wyndham-st/index.html

You all seem to be missing the beauty of it all. We can while away the moments haranguing each other over the properness of riding with a plant. We can insult, slur tease an commiserate. At the end noone is hurt and we share a collective curmudgeony orgasm together only to repaet the beautiful cycle the next day (except weekends and holidays, of course)In the meantime we can all picture a very bitter sounding canuck shitting in his closet.

Anonymous 5:50,While not wanting to speak for anyone else, as a professor I'm very sympathetic to students falling asleep in late-afternoon classes. But if it's an elective, you have only yourself to blame.

Hey all. Sorry to comment so late today, I'm afraid I was at the hospital for most of the day smoking stogies outside the waiting room, waiting to get some x-rays. You see I put the recycling out by the curb for pickup, and was so proud of having fought the battle to save the planet that I separated my shoulder patting myself on the back for having saved Mother Earth from the rest of you gottdamt louse-y Gaia Rapers and your polluting ways.

Honestly, you should fall at my feet and adore me for having single-handedly reversed the global warming trend. Did I tell you I use cloth bags when I go to Whole Foods? I do. Honestly. No Plastic Dolphins were killed in the making of *my* bags. Some people think you need to accept Jesus to be saved, but I think all you need to do is to Reduce, Reuse, and Recycle, and then tell your neighbors about it, and get on their asses real bad if they water their lawns or leave the Christmas... er, the Holiday Lights on at night.

And remember, if it's brown... flush it down. If it's yellow... let it mellow.

I'm glad Bikesnob took aim at these righteous brats. But where were they when they were really needed? This past weekend, I helped move someone from Philly to Riverdale, and I'd really like to see these kids making runs on the Turnpike.

I moved myself from Queens to Bronx a while back using a bike & no one made a video (nor did I want one). Plus I had the good sense to use a bike with gears to haul me, my stuff, and a trailer over the bridges back & forth several times. And that was as I was quitting one job and starting another.

C'mon Snob! You're grasping at straws here. Sure, the Prolly crew is gay and worthy fodder for our entertainment, but this moving endeavor is something: it's actually constructive, and maybe even cool. Riding your bike is cool; commuting by bike is cool; hell, moving by bike seems to me to be pretty cool. You have to have some arrogance, some hubris, to film yourself doing these things, just as you must have some hubris to publish your thoughts on the internet. But we all have this kind of pride inside, so we should be easily forgiven for that. I think if you're able to channel it into something worthwhile or entertaining, then it's okay. This group did it; you usually do. Buck up, Johnny! You'll do better next time.

Lars Trangent,Streetsblog civil? Only if you never challenge the accepted orthodoxy there. Try showing some well researched statistics about cyclists and bike crashes which don't show motorists as 100% at fault 100% of the time and watch the civility disappear faster than a fixie rider trying to climb a steep hill.

Anon 10:18 pm.You really ought to get together with Mr. Whitaker and work out a collabo, you guys both share an uncanny grasp of the obvious. My only hope that is one of you is majoring in film, cause this shit has just got to make it to the big screen. I mean an event as monumental as moving a relatively small amount of stuff a fairly short distance in pretty good weather on bikes is just too big an idea to captured on YouTube. Two visionaries existing at the same time, we are truly blessed.

Wow guys. It only took them three hours. It's amazing what you can do with massive amounts of free labor. Maybe they should also bike-build a pyramid or bike-pick cotton. My god, maybe I'll even put a cog on my seder plate this passover.

Hey everyone, Sorry to miss all the fun for the last few hours. Looks like you were all hard at work without me though. A few things to wrap up..I do have other "self righteous" videos to make so...

Anonymous 5:01, You know your right, i was out of line with the hummer comment. I'm sure you all drive totally un-hip and not at all fashionable 12 speed huffys.

no i don't wear a cone on my head while typing, only while reading or taking a dump.

yes, i am (an i'm sorry someone beat me to it) a douchebag. I'll be the first to admit that. Um, what else... ah yes.. i will totally film you crapping, i'll put it along with my ironic and self aggrandizing videos of me getting kicked in the balls by a non douchebag blog commenter... the the Honolulu movers, let us know when you'll be moving and we will bring out the paddle boats... Also people... if your going to insist on saying that we were looking for fame, have the decency to spell our names right. Stay tuned for my next installment of videos, straight from your own requests: Shitting in a shitbox, dog kennel fun in black and white and lost tourists looking at MTA signs. There will be a bonus scene with that one where i show them how to be a hater on a niche blog of their choice. thanks for the entertainment folks. Ride safe.

i'm thinking bikes, not boats. we're talking drama, excitement here. not too likely to run into anyone else moving their house to harangue enroute except for an alaskan fishing boat carried off in a cyclone or some lost polynesians (not likely... very good navigators). getting through the panama canal and up the rio grande w/o getting shot, or arrested should be a story of its own. condensing it to 10 minutes will be the true challenge, assuming anyone survives of course.

Can't we go back to the good old days when you'd make fun of the DOT and people who drive cars? It makes me cry a little when you make fun of bike moving. Especially since I'm moving my couch via cargo bike Saturday morning (I got the idea from seeing this film on streetsblog! Thanks for making this video!)

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About Me

While I love cycling and embrace it in all its forms, I'm also extremely critical. So I present to you my venting for your amusement and betterment. No offense meant to the critiqued. Always keep riding!